One Minute Breath

So I get asked all the time about my meditation because invariably in any conversation that I’m in, mindfulness, meditation, always comes into play because so many people seem to be stressed all the time or they seem unhappy about one thing or another when talking about mindset. So I’m gonna share with everyone the meditation that I do and I’m happy to talk about this at any time, if anyone wants to get in touch with me.

So it’s called One Minute Breath and it is exactly what it sounds like. I take one breath a minute and I do this for 31 minutes. I essentially take one breath in, I inhale for 20 seconds, then I hold it for 20 seconds, then I exhale for 20 seconds. So there are three sequences, inhale, hold, exhale. Each 20 seconds obviously makes up a minute. That is One Minute Breath. We’ll get, in a second, to what you do during each of the sequences. But the most important thing is keeping the timing of the sequence the same.

So if you’re going to do it, which I suggest that you do you start out doing it for three minutes and you do the sequences for five seconds each. Build yourself up to 20 seconds at 31 minutes. So you inhale for five seconds, you hold it for five seconds and you exhale for five seconds, and you do that for three minutes. You do that for three minutes every day, there will be profound benefits to de-stressing yourself, to being more mindful, to having greater intuition. There’s a lot of technical words that I can use in terms of brain and gray matter and all of that but I’m not gonna go so deep in this video into all of that. But heightened intuition, de-stressing, being more mindful, have you connect with yourself is really, really important. So five seconds intervals, three minutes a day. Try to do this for 40 days in a row. 40 days is about habit forming. Some people say six weeks, 40 days, whatever it may be in Kundalini yoga, we talk about 40 days, so I would strive for that.

Now, when you’re inhaling, you inhale consistently for the five seconds, hold it for five seconds and exhale. It’s all consistent. It’s not fast or slow. It’s the same for all the three sequences. Mostly the inhale and exhale, holding you’re just holding. So while you’re breathing, the key thing to do is really to shut your mind and while you’re shutting our your mind, which is very hard to do thoughts are gonna keep coming, that’s okay. You’re not doing it wrong if thoughts are coming. It’s gonna take a while to slow down those thoughts and then to have those thoughts not come anymore. But the idea is to recognize that you’re spending that time with yourself and you’re connecting with yourself and you’re being mindful. You’re actually living in the present. And it’s okay to think about, as those thoughts are coming in, leave me alone, I’m in the moment, I’m being present and you sort of have that conversation with yourself. You may sort of feel weird, but the idea is that you’re getting control over your mind. You’re not letting your mind control you. So it’s sorta like you’re a third person in the conversation. You have your mind, you have who you think is you and your subconscious, right? And you’re watching that conversation. After time, you’re like, oh my God, I’m sort of seeing this go on and on. I know I’m not crazy, maybe I can really control these thoughts and not be a prisoner of my mind. Let me decide what I wanna do, when I wanna do it, what I wanna think about, how I wanna think about, and that’s really what mindfulness is. But this is a daily practice, something you do every day.

One of the most impactful, profound things that happens when you do this every day not only from de-stressing yourself and clearing your mind is you end up creating space for yourself, with yourself, in that process. You create space for other people. Now, that is really key. Because once you start creating space for other people that’s when real kindness and mindfulness comes into play. Because you start to have empathy and you start to really pay attention to other people and that other people actually exist while you exist. You start to open doors for people. You start to not honk horns at people. You let people cut in front of you when you’re driving, right? That’s all mindfulness, that’s all being present. I’m telling you that your life changes profoundly when you start to do these things every day. It’s very hard to do every day and even myself, who’s been practically saying this for 25 years, there are days, no matter what’s going on, that I slip up and I don’t do all those things, or I may overreact in the moment. Whether it’s an emotional thing or a painful thing, whatever. I still work on it every single day. Look, no one’s perfect, but you gotta start somewhere and I’m well into the process here and I understand all this. And the key thing is, is to first understand it and then really practice it. The key is consistency every single day and keeping those sequences to those time periods.

The best time to do any meditation, yoga, working out, is usually in the morning is when people do it that do it consistently. I wake up every day at 5:00 a.m. to do this, sometimes it’s earlier. It’s rarely later, but that’s the time that I’m able to fit it in, where I know that I do it every single day. I know it seems early and it’s probably a big excuse why people don’t do any meditation, yoga, or exercise because they can’t fit it into their schedule. But this is something to fit into your schedule every single day, even if it means, waking up at a time that you don’t wanna wake up. When you start to do it and you get past that 40 days that I’ve been talking about you forget. Your body just starts to wake up. Your body needs it. I know you know the feeling because everyone at some point in your life has worked out before and once you go three or four days your body starts to need it. It’s all chemically driven inside of you. Same thing happens from meditation. You’re gonna wanna do it again during the day and there’s nothing wrong with doing it twice or three times. But, you know, if you put it off to the next day just make sure you do it. 5:00 a.m., anytime between really 4:00 a.m. and 7:00 a.m. in the morning is really the best time to do it.

I’ve been doing this particular practice, one minute breath, for about, I think it’s 16, a little over 1,600 days in a row. I first set out to do this for a thousand days. That was my initial commitment was a thousand days and I reached that, you know, five or 600 days ago, whatever it may be. And this is something I’m gonna do every day for the rest of my life. I do other things in that morning practice other than just this 31 minutes of one minute breath but I’ve been meditating since 25 years old. But, you know, three, four years ago, I decided to do this with a lot of conversation with some loved ones, family members, specifically my brother. My wife has her own practice. She’s been doing that for, I think, about 470 something days was the last count that I heard. So this is definitely infused into my family at this point. And all of you, my extended friends and family, it’s something I really suggest and propose that you do.

Happy to talk to each and every one of you whenever you’re ready to talk about this. Whether it’s One Minute Breath or any other type of meditation. It’s something to work into your day, every day and the consistency is key to mindfulness and meditation. There are so many different forms of it. Playing golf could be its own form of meditation. Having a baseball catch, walking on the beach, it’s the intent of what you’re doing, when you’re doing it and it works. It’s not kooky, it’s not cultish. It’s none of those things we all used to think that meditation and yoga is. I have more of a meditation practice than a yoga practice. I do do some yoga, but mostly what I do is meditation and it’s had a huge impact on my life. Personally, professionally, family-wise, in every which way possible. So I’m available, happy to talk to you. I would just start today.